i've never seen a more distinguished and better looking group before working for issues that are right. john kerry wooing congress at his nomination hearing obama's secretary of state pick as a practical sure would put so much international on the international agenda right now in the middle east tamale this post is a powerful one we'll bring you the latest from the hearings i knew there was a risk to what i was doing. but i also know that to be seeing the other person is serializing human rights abuses under legal is not the american way. person would by government officials praised by whistleblowers around the world the man who leaked cia torture tactics is certainly

a divisive figure but now john kiriakou is being honored by the government accountability project ahead we'll tell you how. and the u.s. might be looking to end its presence in the middle east but while the troops a drawdown drone strikes remain that counterterrorism tactic is your for the u.s. military this fact has yemen's human rights minister loudly criticizing the pentagon is it time to change the antiterrorism strategy or question more. it's thursday january twenty fourth five pm here in washington d.c. i'm liz wall and you're watching r.t. . we begin today with news from capitol hill where secretary of state nominee john kerry faced a panel of his peers on the senate foreign relations committee where he is currently chair take a listen to how his colleagues reacted to him sitting on the other side of the

table. my sense is your confirmation will go through very very quickly i do look for your testimony. pretty cozy reception we also have some footage of kerry's response to his colleagues i've never seen a more distinguished and better looking group over this is my life i will not take it personally that this may be the one item in washington that seems to unite democrats and republicans to get me out of the senate quickly. well having the senate grill nominees is more than a formality it's an opportunity to properly vet the candidate and make sure they're right for the job looks like the senate already made up their mind on this one meanwhile as john kerry is soaking up the praise we turn now to another john who served on the senate foreign relations committee john kiriakou is a cia veteran that disclosed the practice of waterboarding by the agency and called it

a form of torture the obama administration has charged him with violating the espionage act and he is now facing jail time for what he's made public. but the a.c.l.u. was among karaoke supporters that are calling for his prison sentence to be commuted their recent letter to president obama states quote we urge you to take action in this matter mr president please do not let this injustice stands commute john kiriakou sentence and last night at a cafe here in d.c. kiriakou supporters honored him and others that they say simply speak the truth artie's jestina underhill was there. john kiriakou former cia agent and anti torture whistleblower may never see him self in the national portrait gallery but he was celebrated in a different kind of ceremony when state evening the portrait is the newest edition in the americans who tell the truth series by artist robert shirley one of the things that we believe in in this country it's in our constitution and in our legal

structure is that we don't torture and that's why i paid it john kiriakou human rights activists legal scholars and other supporters turned out for the celebration sponsored by the government accountability project one of those in attendance was bruce fein a top justice department official under reagan we should care because of what it says about us a civilized people doesn't torture anybody period no matter what the conceivable so-called benefits could be this celebration took place just before kiriakou sentencing on friday where he faces thirty months in prison kiriakou first stepped into the public light in two thousand and seven when he first spoke out about waterboarding as a result of waterboarding at least right now is he was the first cia officer to publicly label waterboarding as torture and his a.b.c. appearance helped reveal that waterboarding was in the stablished protocol according to curia his lawyer just one radek it was this interview that triggered the cia investigation cia filed about six or seven crimes reports say against them

none of which the justice department decided to prosecute but clearly they've been gunning for him for a number here and this investigation has taken a toll on curiosity want a family lost a job because she. she was she. really wanted. in october of last year curio pled guilty to violating the intelligence identities protection act in exchange for the government dropping all other charges against him kiriakou is the only. cia officer facing jail time for any action surrounding the government's torture program i never tortured anybody. into prison while the tortures of the lawyers. and the people who deceived and the man who destroyed the proof of the tapes will never face justice in two thousand and eleven he became the six whistleblower charged with violating the espionage act by the obama

administration during the first term the number of whistleblower prosecutions under the espionage act has been unprecedented at seven more than all previous presidential administrations combined the numerous prosecutions brought under the espionage act have certainly put a chill on those willing to speak out without these leaks we wouldn't have known about the cia's interrogation methods or n.s.a.'s warrantless wiretapping and it's these very actions that are being honored here by the government accountability project in washington i'm just you know underhill artsy. well as the u.s. remains committed to carrying out the covert drone war in the middle east yemen to human rights minister is now speaking out against it sure said quote we're committed to fighting terrorism but we're calling for changing the means and strategies these means and strategies can be applied on the ground without harming civilians and without leading to human rights violations this comes as the u.s. ramped up drone strikes in yemen and recent weeks it's all part of the u.s.

is shadow war against islamic militants but the drone attacks are also blamed for killing civilians fuelling anti-american sentiment in regions where the attacks occurred meanwhile the united nations has launched a major investigation into civilian drone deaths are you correspondent stuffy a chair going to join me earlier from the new york studio with more about this investigation by the u.n. . what we have going on is a group of top notch international law specialists bare headed by the un special rapporteur on human rights and counterterrorism launching this investigation into the drone attacks carried out by the united states in recent years they're going to be looking into the drone strikes taking place over somalia yemen of genest and pakistan and the actions of israel when it comes to the occupied territories the group plans to look into from twenty to thirty specific strikes one of the areas they're going to concentrate on are the so-called double tap strikes where rescuers

for example people running to save victims of a drone strike were attacked by a follow up or people going to funerals this is been something that's been a big concern lately with dozens of people dying in those incidents so this is what they're going to look into this is something that's going to last a while they will look into the numbers of casualties the identities of casualties and really the legal liabilities that might follow and this is something that we're not really expecting any kind of legal serious accusations to come out of but one of the things they're looking into is whether or not work crime is a term that can be used a very strong term so this is something that we're going to have to find out when this report finally reveals in the months to come and what prompted this investigation. well that's what prompted this investigation is of course growing concerns that the increased attacks end up killing civilians and children on the ground this is something that's been a big concern for years this is something that's causing a huge anti-american sentiment in places like yemen specifically where recently in

the latest drone strike two children were killed and we saw a group of countries russia china and pakistan addressed the u.n. human rights council and saying look we need to investigate this further so this investigation is now being launched and it's also you know the numbers really speaking for themselves one hundred seventy eight children died just in yemen in recent years eight hundred ninety one civilians since the year two thousand and four just in pakistan so this is something that needs to be addressed and the goal of this particular investigation is exactly that all right so at the conclusion of this investigation what will the result be what with the next step will be in the form of a resolution. well this will take not a form over a solution but rather a report presented by these international law specialists and the key here is that you know unfortunately the reality is that every once in a while the u. one puts together a group of investigators to follow up on these really burning issues but sadly it's

very rare that these kinds of investigations end up anywhere else but the desk drawers of you know u.n. employees in this particular case when it comes to the united states and its allies we've seen often time over and over again that these kinds of investigations don't really have any serious consequences in this particular case the group says they will present the material to the united nations general assembly but we have to keep in mind that the body has absolutely no binding power they say if the findings are strong enough they might take the results of the investigation further this might mean the united nations security council the only body of the one that has any kind of binding legal power but there the united states has veto power so it's definitely not something that's likely to cause major change in u.s. policy liz ok so it's kind of up in the air or it seems like you're pretty skeptical that it could actually change the way that the the drone war has been carried has been carried out in places like yemen and pakistan. that's right

because you know it's just it's a very simple forecast because we can look at the previous examples of these kinds of reports they do cause some kind of a stir they are talked about even though there are sometimes very headline making information revealed but unfortunately we're not probably going to hear much about this from u.s. officials that have been completely hush hush about the whole drone war operations that they're conducting in this case they have promised to kind of cooperate they have to cooperate because they're legally binded to do so but my forecast is yes unfortunately very where very unlikely to see any tangible results and change in u.s. policy come out of this you know hopefully i'm wrong but previous examples have showed but to be the case i guess we're going to have to wait and see appreciate you staying on top of this story on a sunday and i was our correspondent on a saucy turn to. after the tragic shooting in newtown connecticut across the country people are trying to find ways to make communities safer and new york city

of police hopes to catch your legal gun carriers with full body scanners but if ice is called a terror hurts imaging detection it works by scanning a targeted person had to tell and can detect when someone is carrying a gun as the scanners do its job those targeted have no idea they are being scanned so is this a new way to keep our streets safe or is this invasion of privacy to discuss this and more i was joined by danny pendle of the truth squad t.v. and i first asked him to tell us more about the technology and how it will be used . well that's still up in the air the n.y.p.d. says they're studying it how exactly they can implement it early reports were that they were going to be mounting these scanners in trucks or the back of police cars and as they patrol the streets they'd be scanning the passenger trains rather. walking up and down new york city streets and if they see something that resembles a gun then that they would use that is they're just they're just there reasonable

suspicion to perform a search so ray kelly the police commissioner is saying this is going to actually reduce stop and frisks because they only have to stop and frisk people that they actually see have weapons. who have who fight and why p.d. injustices know that this will be used as an excuse to stop and search anybody because now anything can look like a weapon anything can look like drug paraphernalia if i'm carrying a pen are they going to say it's a syringe or a knife and now that now they have a legal justification that covers them to perform a stop that really would be illegal otherwise so this technology doesn't sound like this technology is very accurate where whatever it attacks they know in fact that it is a gun. well obviously the closer the subject is to the to the technology probably the more accurate of a visual they will get but no i mean if you're scanning as you're driving up and down the streets you know people are moving it's going to be very difficult to

really i mean obviously the shape of a gun is going to be more obvious then you know but they're not only looking for guns gun confiscations as a result of stop stop and frisk is like a point zero one percent so the majority of stop and frisk basically yields drug paraphernalia you know things of that nature small weapons like like knobs that are maybe a little bit too long to fall within the law that type of stuff so you know to say that this is going to stop guns is really disingenuous but there is just the issue of invasion of privacy there's no warrants involved people don't even know they're being virtually searched with this technology so that's a big issue in itself you know this whole that they are supposed to have. permission i guess when people went police stop you and conduct these searches and there's supposed to be some form of evidence but i guess in this case it kind of

gives them a free pass is that what you're saying that's right the scanner itself can act as the evidence so all they need to say is well it looked like a gun on the scanner or it looked like a knife on the scanner that gave us the justification to stop this person and then we found nothing you know so they can blame it on the technology becomes a scapegoat right going along with this justification that it will make us safer i mean it in some scenarios i guess it can because they will presumably be able to identify people that actually are carrying weapons do you think it's worth giving up some of our freedoms and the name of safety especially in the wake of some of these tragic shootings that we've been seeing. absolutely not the peaveys own numbers prove that they are not confiscating guns as a result of this policy so now to just take it a step further and say we're just going to scan everybody without consent and without any kind of evidence. under the guise of keeping us safe for is is just

absolutely ludicrous and is a complete violation of the bill of rights. all right you know it it's interesting that this comes up because we've been reporting a lot about how basically. these do things that are popping up that that kind of infringe on our privacy and it does seem like we're being filmed everywhere that we especially when you're in a in a big city like new york city so is this just kind of you know just the new normal . well obviously they're going to encroach on our liberties as as much as we allow them to and that's why i'm encouraging everybody to get in touch with the legislate legislators and tell them we're not going to tolerate being scanned without consent i mean at least if they're stopping frisking somebody that person has the the option to assert their rights and say you don't have the right to stop me unless you have seen me committing a crime or you believe that i just have committed a crime or at least there's some sort of reasonable suspicion but if they're just stopping people at random now because they have this this machine that they can use

is their scapegoat. this will just be one more encroachment and we have to protect our liberties there's really no. there's no justification for it i really it actually infuriates me because this is going this this stop and frisk tool that they call it is only being used in certain neighborhoods and it's not it's not an equal application of the laws so there's really there's so many problems with it not to mention the health problems that come along with the terahertz scanners the mit put out a report saying that terahertz waves actually tear apart d.n.a. that's the phrase they use so there's a huge health risk that should be studied before these are implemented as well well and we are seeing the backlash just recently the t.s.a. news that they're going to be removing those controversial scanners that they put into air patel airports across the country they're now removing those so we are seeing a backlash to these kinds of technologies that people find invasive want to ask you

. what you said there's privacy concerns you see this as. a concern to our constitutional rights constitutional concerns. yes absolutely is absolutely an invasion or a violation of the bill of rights this is an unwarranted search it's a virtual search they may not be touching you but they are searching you without you knowing it without any proof without any warrant the founders were very clear in the wording of the bill of rights that if you suspect someone of a crime you have to go to a judge and get a warrant and it has to be based on very specific information you need to provide you need to say i want to search their person because i believe they're carrying a gun for x. y. z. reasons it's not just well we just think he's a criminal because he's wearing baggy pants so we want to search him. do you fear that are anticipate that this could become the norm a new method that police departments across the country are going to implement absolutely this is part of a federal campaign and the n.y.p.d.

serves as a model for police departments not only in our country but all over the world so they basically what they do is they beta test these technologies you know there's one hundred other things that they're testing right now including i phone apps that actually facially recognize they can scan your face and skin your eye and take a biometric reading of your eye and they put that in their database they're testing that right now the n.y.p.d. this is all coming from grants from the homeland security department they're funding the technology it's a way for the federal government to take control of police departments they buy influence with with saying well we're going to give you the latest crime fighting tools this technology that you'd never be able to afford on your own we're going to give it to you or you have to do is send all the information back to us and they do that through the n.y.p.d. intelligence division fusion center very interesting and eye opening appreciate you coming on and telling us all about unfortunately our at a time that was danny pans out from truth squad t.v. . so i hear an r.t.s.

college student in canada has been expelled for hacking into the school's computer network kicked out despite the fact that he was trying to help the school cyber security lapses by exposing. the threat his story. let me let me again i will let me ask you point. one this morning is what will happen in the day we are going. to be this was a bad thing there again here it is the way we're being i don't agree to talk about theory when we're.

a canadian college student has been expelled for exposing security flaws in the computers in the school's computer system computer science student named. ahmed al found a vulnerability while working on a mobile app that allows students to access their college accounts on their phones this is according to wired laws would have enabled students to access sensitive information like addresses class schedules and social insurance numbers these numbers are similar to social security numbers in the u.s. and he wanted to bring this attention to dawson college in montreal but the president of the software company called what did a form of a cyber attack and shortly thereafter the college expelled him for his conduct from or michael gregg c.e.o.

of superior solutions joins me now welcome barry michael so this really be considered a cyber attack as that company called it. well typically this type of activity isn't really call the cyber attacks but there's really two pieces of the story one that he found the problem in the code the second one was that he used to scanning products to actually scan to see if the problem had been fixed once he scanned their network that typically sets off alarms and sets all triggers because it's using times to test a network or potentially as the prequel to an attack ok so you know the protocols are there a sense that there was something going on there but the fact that he's expelled and there's all these repercussions i mean how can it be considered an attack if he never intended to harm anyone or steal any information that's kind of tough but

here would be the big thing i would say we do security assessments we do pin testing and generally the protocol is you never scan a network you never run a port scan you never run any type of tool against that network until you've been given written permission so that's generally the protocol ok so regardless of what his intentions dead at what he ended up doing is considered. is considered harmful no matter how you cut it. not so much harm for the police that i would describe it as bad form because informing them that there was a problem i see nothing wrong with that that's a real helpful role but one see crossed the line and actually scanned i think you really crossed the line at that point right there network yes i do and i do understand the protocol but it's i guess it's hard for me to wrap my head around why the school would expel him as he's trying to expose these flaws in their system

seems to me like something there doesn't that doesn't add up. and i know that you actually are your job is is to do this is is to hack into networks into computers in an effort to expose vulnerabilities so it so it sounds like that this is kind of a sought after service it is it is very much so and i guess the one thing i would say about this is. i think maybe they went a little too far in expelling him but i mean i don't know all the facts but what i would actually wonder is many times what happens is that a sign can kill the messenger meaning that after you actually exposed sometimes people don't like being told that there's a problem they don't like finding out potentially something to be exploited and at that point maybe they just wanted it all to go away well i mean on the flip side i guess what could have happened is if he didn't expose

a flaw that somebody with bad intentions that didn't want to steal information. would have done so and then the school would have would have found out the hard way . sure and i agree with you on that i think after he discovered the flaw and he reported it before he ever actually scans or network should have at least said hey can i scan your network do you mind if i scan your network of you fix the problem going to make this public and such and such day i'm going to tell the press i'm going to do some type of responsible process of letting others know that this could be a problem right. so now this college dolphin college over there in monterey al the latest that i've heard is that they're not going to take him back but it seems like he's getting a lot of job offers after that this. very software company where. i guess hacked is now how offering him a job this is according to the national post so when you say that good hackers are

in demand these days. my definitely good actors are always in demand and that's good because i was going to say most definitely i would think probably has a good skill set there that's needed just look at the news on any one particular day and you'll see news of security breaches a medical records being exposed to other types of data being potentially there. on the news so good set of skill i would wonder though with the company that actually came back even offered him a job they were doing that simply to offer him a job or they're trying to make the best of the situation now that they've got him kicked out of school right right yeah. so we see this case he he is facing the consequences he got expelled from college and this is coming after this tragic case aaron swartz the renowned internet internet activist who is facing

a good amount of jail time for for what he's accused of hacking into a computer database and trying to distribute that information out of people saying that in that case that was prosecutorial overage so we are seeing a lot of. harsh penalties for for these kinds of computer computer crimes so do you think that maybe it's time that the laws that they need to be strengthened to determine you know what exactly is it is a cyber attack and what the appropriate penalties are. most definitely i think the really tough part is if you look back in the one nine hundred ninety s. that you look back maybe ten years or so many times that penalties were not very at the time and with anything there always tends to be a whiplash or kind of a backlash over time and i think that's what you're seeing here is because there's been so many reports in the news that even simply doing a port scan or maybe simply starting to talk about something that you may have

found that could be a vulnerability of people we're very sensitive to that today very interesting and michael really appreciate you coming on the show and shedding some light on this that was michael gregg the seat superior solutions. coming up in thirty minutes is breaking the set with abby maher and let's check in with abby to see what is on today's agenda abbi what's going on over there. got a packed show like always first were speaking to our correspondent lisa coughing off the ground in jordan coming right off the elections that just happened they were talking about were these elections really just a show did they really do anything to quell the dissent that's really swelling up in the country what's going to happen the opposition groups there all of that stuff and more with lucy and then we're going to feature the second exclusive part of our interview with kim dotcom megaupload founder an internet take hoon andrew blake our

web producer this guy back in new zealand so we're going to show in that part of the interview we're going to be talking about internet freedom privacy anonymous hacktivism that and a lot more with kim dotcom exclusive interview coming up next and we're also talking about knowing your rights in the police state what to do if you're stopped by cops i think is just something that a lot of people don't really know what rights we do have so we're really talking about that and more coming up next is certainly some useful information coming up i'm going to have to ted thanks for that update abbi that is coming up and a half hour but that is going to do it now for the news from one of the stories we covered you can always check out our you tube channel that's you tube dot com slash our team america post everything there online and full you can also check out our website that's our t.v. dot com slash u.s. air producers are busy working on stories that we sometimes air on our newscast but sometimes i also get to.